


a story of perhaps

by punkfaery



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen, Season 05, hints of merlin/mordred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-29
Updated: 2017-03-29
Packaged: 2018-10-12 08:38:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10486722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/punkfaery/pseuds/punkfaery
Summary: "You've changed, you know," Mordred said.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: this is a very old fic. I found it when going through my archives, and figured I might as well clean it up and post it for the potential appreciation of the 1.4 people who are still a part of the Merlin fandom. I've always been intrigued by Merlin's potential to become a darker sort of character, particularly in terms of his parallels with Morgana and how far he might be willing to go in order to protect Arthur. Comments and kudos are always welcome!

 

(He’s thought of it before. Not often, though. Once. Twice. Perhaps more than that.

It would be so easy.)

* * *

“You’ve changed, you know,” Mordred said.

Merlin flinched so hard that his elbow knocked painfully against the wall. He’d been sitting cross-legged on the floor in Arthur’s chambers for the past half an hour, cleaning boot after boot, the work so mind-numbing that it had lulled him into a kind of daze. Perhaps that was why he hadn’t heard the door opening.

Annoyed at himself for his reaction, he nodded a greeting at the other man. It was a gesture of politeness only, but Mordred seemed to take it as an invitation. “Sorry if I startled you,” he said quietly, stepping further into the room.

“I didn’t hear you come in.” Merlin dipped his head and returned to cleaning the boot, scrubbing without really looking at it. His hands were stained with black grime from the polish. “What do you mean, I’ve changed?”

“From when I first met you. You were – different then. What happened to you?”

 “Nothing in particular,” Merlin said. “That was a long time ago. Years. People change, that’s just what happens.”

Mordred hesitated, then sat. Merlin fought the urge to edge away from him. “Do you need any help with that?”

Merlin shook his head. “I’m fine. Thanks, though.”

There was silence between the two of them, then. From outside the arched windows a frosty winter sun poured in, turning the decorations on the bed-frame to a brilliant gold, and the muffled sounds of trademakers, vendors and passers-by drifted up from the street below. There was a certain quality to the light that made it feel somehow timeless, as though he’d accidentally stepped through the wrong door and gone back ten years. Only Mordred’s presence beside him betrayed the illusion.

Mordred broke the stillness, cautiously. “I mean, I know people change,” he said. “I changed, didn’t I?”

“Yes,” Merlin agreed. “I suppose you did.”

“But not like you.” Mordred tilted his head, watching him with curiosity. “You’re…I don’t know. Stranger than before. Colder.”

“Don’t start acting like I’m about to go on the rampage and kill everybody in Camelot,” Merlin said, forcing a smile. “Honestly. I’ve always been loyal to Arthur, and I always will be. That won’t change, just because I’ve grown up a little.”

Another pause. Then, after a moment, Mordred blurted out, “Everything I’ve heard about you – everything I’ve read – ” His hands clenched, twisting together. “You weren’t supposed to be like this.”

That stung.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” Merlin snapped. “But you know, I’m not a story, Mordred. I’m not some legend. I’m human, all right?”

“I know that,” Mordred said quickly, as if dismissing his words out of hand. “But remember when I first came here? You saved my life. Got me out of the castle and helped me escape. You didn’t care what Arthur thought then, didn’t care about the greater good, didn’t care about _consequences._ You did what your heart told you to do.”

“That doesn’t count. I was reckless. Stupid.”

“No,” said Mordred. “You were kind.”

Merlin felt a chill pass unwarranted down his spine. Kind. Yes. Perhaps once; perhaps then. But not any longer. He grew up, grew stronger, grew harder, until he could stand up to the blows, and had no need to waste kindness on those who did not need it. He grew up, and breathed a sigh of relief, and then he realised that the world around him wasn’t about to stop, not for anything. It kept going, uncaring of those it left in its wake.

“Hey, I’m still the same person,” Merlin said. “You know. Clumsy, forgetful, lazy, all the rest of it. Just ask Arthur!”

“Perhaps,” Mordred said, but he didn’t look convinced.

Merlin stared at him, and thought distantly of a knife, a vial of poison, a crossbow. He thought of blue eyes, clouded over with nothing behind them. They could have belonged to Arthur, or to Mordred, or to Merlin himself. There was no way of telling any longer.

* * *

 

The next time was out amidst the wilderness, after Merlin had sent the dragon away from them into the sky in a blaze of white flame and scales and a roar that seemed to rend the air in two. For just one moment, he faced Mordred and felt himself beginning to smile. They were safe now, at least for the foreseeable future. Once they’d taken shelter behind that rock, all they needed to do was –

A cry, Morgana’s cry, and a flash of gold, and he had no time to respond before he felt his feet left the ground. For a moment he hung there, weightless; then the rocks came up towards him, and he hit them hard enough to knock the breath from his body.

He lay, winded. Beside him, Mordred was still, eyes closed, a thin trail of red wending its way down from his temple towards his hairline.

For a moment, Merlin hesitated. He could lift him, drag him back to where Arthur was hiding with Gwen. Mordred would wake up presently and they could carry on together, the same as before. Or he could leave him. Leave him here, injured and unconscious and at the mercy of Morgana. Assuming she had any of that left, of course.

Merlin stood.

The choice was made in a second. It was easy. It was always easy.

* * *

 “I’m sorry I left you behind,” Merlin said later. They were riding back to Camelot, Arthur and Gwen far ahead of them, and hopefully out of earshot. Every time he glanced over at Mordred, he couldn’t help but feel a sort of hollow disappointment opening up inside him. Was he disappointed at himself, for not taking the opportunity to save the other man? Or was he disappointed for an entirely different reason?

Merlin cut his thoughts off. He wouldn’t go there. Not now.

“It’s all right,” Mordred said, and smiled.

“No, really. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have abandoned you, I should have done something, I – ”

“Merlin, I understand.” Mordred spurred the horse into a forward trot, aiming to catch up with the others. “Honestly. You did what you had to do.”

Merlin just nodded. He’d been telling himself that a lot lately.

He could talk to someone, he supposed. They could reassure him. Gaius would reassure him. It was normal to feel this way: he had, after all, spent his whole life saving others, with little to no recognition for any of it. He’d watched people he loved die in front of his eyes, and more than once it had been his fault. It was natural for him to feel jaded. It was natural, he thought, to be angry. _(Except that he wasn’t. Anger would be so much easier, so much better than this coldness, this lack of – of_ anything _– )_

Perhaps he should tell someone.

But that was no good, was it? It didn’t matter how many people you told, how many times you offered your truths up to the world, hoping someone would look and listen and make it all feel less frightening. Some things didn't go away. Some things stayed stuck inside you, slowly turning rotten because there was no way of cleaning them out.

Perhaps he should tell someone.

Perhaps.

* * *

“Emrys,” the Dochraid greeted him.

Merlin squinted in the darkness, and made out a hunched form in the corner, bent into itself like a dead spider. She turned her head, and he saw the mesh of skin covering her eyes, dark holes visible behind it. He repressed a shudder. 

“It has been a long time,” she said. “I see you still have not revealed yourself.”

Merlin’s breath caught. “How – how do you know about that?”

“I know all things, Emrys.” She sounded calm, even amused. “You play the part well.”

Merlin felt his skin grow hot, muscles tensing, as if his skin was drawing tight over the bones underneath it. “What?” His voice was hoarse, even for an old man, and he coughed to clear his throat. “What part?”

“The great King Arthur’s servant – dare I say friend, even?” Behind the whitish membrane of webbing, he knew her eyes were glittering. “The joker, the trickster, the faithful dog. Always so brave. So _selfless._ You fool them all, but you do not fool me. There is a darkness inside your heart.”

The denial came easily to his lips, but when he opened his mouth, it did not emerge. An inexplicable panic rose in his chest. _She is the darkness to your light; the hatred to your love,_ the Great Dragon had said. Merlin remembered that, heard the voice clear and sharp in his head, and thought – for the first time since he’d first heard it – how utterly ridiculous that was. Everyone had darkness inside them somewhere, just as everyone has light. It was just that some people had more of one than of the other. He wondered how much light was in Morgana. Not much, probably. Perhaps just a crack of it, like the golden strip showing beneath a closed door.

If he was honest with himself, he admired the way Morgana killed. Sleek and lethal, dispatching her prey with as much care as a cat would have for a bird or a mouse. He marvelled at the ease of it – the simplicity – and part of him wished he could do as she did. To fight selfishly, without fear; to be free of guilt, of mercy.

It would be so _easy._

“I have seen that darkness before,” the Dochraid said. She was watching him, calculating. “But only in one other.”

 _She’s not to be trusted_ , Gaius had said, and Merlin knew it; she was trying to trick him, to manipulate him, to tug the strings and probe his weak points. He couldn’t listen to anything she said. But it was too late – her words had already sunk into him and gone somewhere deep inside, where nobody else could see them. “I have only ever been loyal to Arthur,” he managed finally, echoing his words to Mordred.

A smile teased her lips – or at least, if it had been present upon any other creature, it would have been called a smile. “Perhaps,” she said.

It was tempting to dispose of her completely. A way of erasing what she’d said, erasing _her._ But in the end, he didn’t. A part of him felt that it would only have proved her point. He merely wounded her instead, and tried to ignore the sense of satisfaction that stemmed from hearing her boiling blood hiss on the cold stone floor.

* * *

_(Mordred. Laid out clammy and white as the underbelly of a fish, except for the dark mouthlike wound bisecting his throat. Eyelids purpled. Fingers stiff.)_

_(Morgana. Choking, gagging, her lips turning pale, the look of betrayal turning to pain and finally to an awful blankness.)_

_(Arthur. Silver steel protruding from his gut at an odd angle. Eyes clouding over. Dropping to one knee. A hand on his side, fingers red.)_

“You all right there, Merlin?”

Arthur’s voice was offhand, concern thinly veiled. Merlin jerked out of his daze and turned, flashing him a grin.

“Fine. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” Arthur tossed a linen shirt at him, and Merlin just managed to catch it, fingers fumbling. “Only…well, you haven’t exactly been yourself recently. That time of the month again, is it?”

“Something like that,” Merlin said, evasively.

“Anyway, you’d better not be too under the weather.” Arthur straightened up, crunching his neck to one side. “I need you to prepare the horses. Make sure they’re ready in the next half an hour. I’m going hunting with a few of the knights. We’ll be bringing back some venison for tonight’s feast.”

 “Mordred too?”

Arthur gave him a bit of a funny look. “Of course.”

Taking care to keep his thoughts from reaching his eyes, Merlin nodded at him solemnly. “Your wish is my command, sire, as always.”

This time, he wasn’t quick enough. The towel hit him in the face.

“Less of the cheek, please,” Arthur said, heading out into the hallway. Then as he reached the doorway he halted, seemingly deliberating over something. Eventually: “Merlin?”

“Still here,” Merlin agreed, peeling the towel off his face.

“You’d tell me if there was something really wrong, wouldn’t you?”

The answer took less than a second to formulate. “’Course I would,” Merlin told him. “You know me – I never miss a chance to burden other people with my problems.”

“Right,” Arthur said. He chewed on his lip, an uncharacteristically uncertain gesture. “Well. That’s good, then.”

“Mm.”

Merlin thought of the knife, gleaming sleek and fish-silver, and he pushed the thought back inside himself and let it fester, deep down there in the dark.

 


End file.
